365 days of skiing: Toronto-area indoor downhill facility to be first 'dryslope' in Canada

A warmer-than-average start to the Canadian winter is leaving a lot of skiing and snowboarding enthusiasts out in the cold. Those athletes need not worry about losing their edge, however, because a company in Vaughan, Ont. is opening Canada’s first ever dry slope freestyle skiing and snowboarding dryslope this spring – an indoor facility for skiers and snowboarders.

Axis Freestyle Academy is not to be confused with other winter sports simulation facilities that basically have you riding around in a small square box moving underneath you the way a treadmill would. Watch this video to see how the concept is different:

Pro snowboarder Jack Labbett carves his way through the specially made AstroTurf-style platform, which is designed to feel like actual snow without any need for Mother Nature or a snowmaking machine. Believe it or not, the white stuff you see kicking up behind the rider in the video isn’t snow or even a synthetic powder for that matter, it’s actually just water.

A dryslope uses man-made materials to mimic the snow on a ski slope. If you look closely, you'll see the slope is built using gridded tiles, covered in tiny bristles. The name 'dryslope' can be a bit of a misnomer, as they are often misted with water to reduce the buildup of friction. Unlike snow, it provides consistent conditions for skiiers and snowboarders to train on, which makes it great for people just learning to ski, as well as serious athletes trying to refine their skills. The one caveat is that it isn't as forgiving as snow: skis need a harder wax when going down a dryslope, and it will need to be reapplied more often.

Although the indoor fake snow concept is new to Canada, the co-founders of Axis Freestyle Academy actually got the idea from a company in California, where there aren’t very many snow days or huge slopes available for winter sports-lovers.

The founders of the Axis Freestyle Academy are high school friends who developed a love for snowboarding and have travelled to places like Switzerland, France and Canada’s snowboard and skiing capital Whistler, B.C. to pursue their passion for the sport.

Inspired by their own needs, the trio realized they wanted to build a place for riders to be able to train on Canadian soil when there is no snow available. Co-founder Alex Ching says the goal is to provide both people who are new to performing jumps and tricks on skis and boards with the same development and training opportunities that already exist for other sports across the country.

“There are gyms throughout the city for all kinds of activities,” Ching says. “There’s even a facility downtown for obstacle course racing. There’s always a place in the off-season for people to work on their skills and other sports so we figured why not have the same thing for the sport that we love to do?”

And so Ching and his friends, Simon Chang and Adam Zig are packing these synthetic snow freestyle courses together with trampolines, rails, foam pits, a gym and a yoga studio to help wannabe tricksters take the sport as far as they want to, whether it means participating as a hobby or making it to the Winter Olympics or Winter X Games someday.

If watching the video got you so pumped up you want to strap on the snowboard right now, you’ll have to wait until the spring. The academy is being built inside of a 20,000 square-foot facility and the doors should be ready to open by April at the latest.

Until then its looks like we’ll just have to settle for hoping there’s enough real snow to ski on soon.